


Hey Roomie

by FlowerChild22



Category: Brooklyn Nine-Nine (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - College/University, F/M, Roommates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-29
Updated: 2018-01-01
Packaged: 2018-10-25 07:46:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10759860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FlowerChild22/pseuds/FlowerChild22
Summary: AU where he's her annoying childhood neighbour (sort of, his Nana lived next door and he basically lived there) and Amy is more than fed up with her family and Jake Peralta.Her mom suggests that Jake be her new roommate while she finishes college and prepares for the academy. Amy briefly considers faking her own death.





	1. Yellow Markers

**Author's Note:**

> If anything is wrong please forgive me, I'm just a random from 'Down Undah' who loves this American show too much. Despite my ancestors, the extent of my Spanish are words that are the same in Filipino. 
> 
> There's also going to me much more swearing in this than the actual show because 1. Rosa would be a swearer, 2. Amy would be a swearer growing up with seven brothers and 3. Jake would be a swearer, because a kid raised on Die Hard? Come on, there isn't a movie where Bruce Willis hasn't said fuck/fucker/motherfucker at least twenty times. So apologies if I offend!
> 
> Enjoy!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amy is presented with a problem when her best friend has to move interstate. Amy's mom has a solution.

“So, I have news.”

Kylie’s usual carefree tone held a little more weight to it than usual, at least enough for Amy to stop flicking through the take-out menus and look up at her best friend.

Kylie is generally loud, brash and spontaneous; the exact opposite of Amy, which she supposes is the reason their friendship and roommate-relationship works. Amy keeps the order, while Kylie brings the chaos. So her tone makes Amy curious, but her expression makes Amy think she’s fucked up.

The smile Kylie gives her is pleased but apprehensive; the same smile Amy recognises from that time Kylie borrowed her favourite trousers for a job interview and then spilled gravy onto the inner thigh area. Fortunately, she got the job and so was able to pay for the dry cleaning expense.

“What?” Amy demands, starting to feel nervous. “Have you borrowed my _only_ pant suit and ripped the seams? Cause I saved up for months to be able to buy that!”

“Yeah, I know,” Kylie tells her. She gives Amy a look. “Probably saved up too much for a pant suit. I mean, a _pant suit_ _Amy_. You’re barely 21; you should be blowing your pay check on Jimmy Choos or even better, alcohol.”

Amy frowns at Kylie. “I need a good, tailored pant suit. Everyone should have one. I could wear it for a job interview, or meeting clients at the gallery, or even—“

“I swear to God if you say a date, I will punch you in the boob,” Kylie interrupts her with one finger raised. “Girl, I love you, but you need help.”

Amy crosses her arms and doesn’t admit that Kylie is right. “So what’s the news?”

Kylie immediately grins again and claps her hands in front of her mouth. “I got in!”

Amy drops her arms immediately and the take-out menus fall out of her lap when she jumps up to squeeze her arms around her friend.

“Oh my God!” Amy says, unable to put her happiness into words. “Congrats!”

Kylie shrugs as they pull back and smirks. “No biggie, just two grown women moving up in the world. Me going to grad school, you getting into the academy to become a captain.”

Amy’s embarrassed by the enthusiastic smile she knows is spreading across her face and tries to shrug Kylie off casually. “There’s still such a long way to go, but getting into the academy is the next step.”

“We _have_ to celebrate!” Kylie squeezes Amy’s hands and does a little shimmy. “We need to go out.”

Amy groans. “Kylie, _no_. I’m still hungover from graduation.”

“Screw you,” Kylie scoffs. “I mean like a real fancy, adult dinner at like a five star restaurant.”

Amy looks around their small Manhattan apartment, where the ghastly green wallpaper is slightly peeling around the ceiling and the take-out menus scattered on their scavenged coffee table. They had driven to the richer houses in New York and spent the day gathering as much furniture as they could in the truck they borrowed from one of Amy’s brothers.

“Okay, maybe four star,” Kylie amends.

Amy looks at her again with an eyebrow raised.

Kylie huffs. “I’m sure we can afford at least a three star restaurant. Right? Fuck it, let’s just blow money on a stupidly expensive dinner and dress up fancy for once. We deserve it!”

She kicks the menus near her feet away and grabs Amy’s hand to drag her into her bedroom. “Now come on, we need to find appropriate outfits that are fun but still modest.”

Amy shakes her head and laughs. She drops herself onto Kylie’s bed and watches as Kylie starts to riffle through her closet. It’s half bare, much to Amy’s amusement because most items are scattered all over the bed and chair by the desk.

“ _Loca chica, me vas a matar_ ,” Amy tells her.

“You know that when you talk Spanish to me it turns me on.” Kylie spins on her heel with a floral dress in her hand to scold her.

Amy can only roll her eyes in response to that. She says instead, “You’re leaving me. Traitor.”

Kylie pouts and drops down onto the bed next to Amy. She lays her head on her shoulder and sighs, a big deep one that Amy can feel in her bones. “I know.”

It’s Amy’s turn to sigh when she says, “Now I have to find a new place and roommate. That’ll be fun.”

Kylie shrugs. “It might not be so bad. Worst case, you can move back home for at least the summer.”

Amy shakes her head. “No way. I’ll do anything else but that.”

Kylie sits up and grins cheekily. “Even be a hooker?”

Amy drags a pillow towards her and smacks Kylie in the face with it. “I’m training to be a police officer!”

Kylie only laughs and falls back onto the bed. Amy follows suit and turns her head to see Kylie watching her.

“I’m going to miss you,” she tells Amy earnestly.

Amy closes her eyes and smiles. “I’ll miss you too.”

 

\--

 

“So you and Kylie will look for another place?” Her mom inquires, spooning more rice onto her dad’s plate. He grunts in acknowledgement and continues to chew vigorously on a mouthful of chicken.

Amy reaches for more broccoli—her dad’s doctor highlighted that his cholesterol is a problem, which he’s currently not doing much to improve despite her mom’s attempt to increase his green vegetable intake—only to give herself an excuse to busy her hands, her eyes while she thinks of a way to tell them that Kylie is moving interstate for grad school.

“Kylie got a grad offer,” she begins slowly. Neither of her parents is looking in her direction, but she can feel a heaviness in her shoulders that makes it feel like they’re glaring daggers at her. “She’s moving interstate.”

“What will you do, _niña_?” Her father asks genuinely, but Amy knows he’s worried she doesn’t have a plan.

But she’s Amy, _of course_ she has a plan.

“I’ve been asking around and looking at ads for rooms,” she tells them. She winces internally; it sounds like she hasn’t got it figured out. But she does, she knows what kind of place she’s looking for, how much and how far she’s willing to commute to the academy. A two bedroom apartment, with or without a current occupant, who is neat, organised and could possibly cook; no more than $500 a month including bills; no more than 50 minutes.

Except, what she wants and what’s out there are mutually exclusive.

So she has a plan. It’s just taking longer than usual.

Her mom immediately turns to her dad, a worried crease between her dark eyebrows and rests her arm on Victor Santiago’s arm. “Do we know anyone who is renting?”

Victor pauses in his meal to think deeply on this question, but his wife beats him to it, straightening up in her seat and slamming her palms on the gingham covered table.

“I know,” she tells them. “I bumped into Karen the other day at the bodega—she was looking for a good salsa—and she was saying how her son, what’s his name, I forget it now, has a spare room. He’s in Queens, which is near the academy?”

 _Karen, Karen, Karen_. The name spins around Amy’s head trying to place it. She’s about to ask her mom if she knows her last name but then a name flashes in her mind and it immediately causes her to sour. Hopefully she’s not right. Except that she’s always right, but she hopes she’s wrong on this.

“Ah!” Her mom cries out in recognition. “I remember it now, Jacob!”

Amy wills her face to stay neutral. “Oh? Jake? Jake Peralta?”

Her mom is nodding enthusiastically now. “Yes, yes! That young Jewish boy.”

Amy doesn’t point out that he’s no longer a young boy and that mentioning that he’s Jewish is an unnecessary detail, but she has no doubt now that her mom is talking about the boy whose grandmother lived down the street.

“I don’t think—“ She begins to protest, but her mom interrupts her as if she hadn’t stopped.

“I told Karen that if I knew someone I would tell her.” She’s still busying herself with loading her plate with _moros_. “And now I can let her know!”

“I never really like that boy,” her dad supplies. “He was always too sticky. _Niña_ always hated that.”

Amy almost hugs her dad in joy relief. He’ll talk sense into her mom.

“But,” he continues and she stares at her dad in horror, “he’s a grown man now, so probably not sticky. You should contact him, it will be cheaper and he’s a cop.”

“ _Si, si_ ,” her mom chants. “He can help with training, _niña_.”

Amy wants to drop her head into her _moros_. Her parents could not possibly be suggesting she move in with _Jake Peralta_. As a child he was messy, loud and inconsiderate with her organised markers—you just _don’t_ use yellow on top of black, even if you are drawing a bee. He was the reason she would bring her spare set to school and keep her good markers at home.

“But, _mamá_ , _papi_ ,” she begins, but she doesn’t know how to finish her sentence. _He’s sticky; he’s loud; he ruined her markers_. “He’s _Jake Peralta_.”

Her mom just smiles at her. “He’s grown now, I’m sure he’s fine. He was a good kid; all the boys got along with him.”

“That’s true,” her dad agrees.

Amy doesn’t bother explain that her brothers were nightmares to live with and even as adults are hopeless. It’s a wonder how one of them has a _child_.

Amy sighs and decides to let her mom have this one; it’s not as if she’ll actually tell Karen she’s interested and even if that happens she doesn’t think that Jake would want to room with her. They haven’t seen each other since high school and it would just be . . . awkward.

So she just smiles at her mom and says, “I guess.”

She mom smiles at that and the matter is dropped as Amy had hoped and dinner continues on with no mention of Jake Peralta or his stickiness. 


	2. Ambush Party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amy is ambushed at her family's party. Nothing has changed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. I haven't yet thought of how I'm going to incorporate Charles, so be patient. I also haven't decided whether Holt or Terry will fit into the story.
> 
> 2\. I don't know how often I can update this, all dependent on when inspiration strikes unfortunately. 
> 
> Enjoy lovelies!

“ _Niña_ , are you free _sábado_?”

Amy can barely hear her mom’s voice through her phone and she tries to adjust the call volume only to find that it’s maxed out. She assumes that her mom is probably cooking or gardening or doing some sort of multitasking and has the phone away from her mouth, despite the fact Amy and her brothers has taught her how to put a call on speaker phone many, many times.

“Yeah, I think so, why?” She asks distractedly. She’s currently attempting to pack away all her winter clothing and bedding into moving boxes. She might not have a place to move to yet, but it’s never too early to start organising her things.

“Some of your brothers are visiting, so might as well have a _fiesta_ ,” her mom tells her enthusiastically.

Amy smiles at that; her mom always liked when they were able to have family dinner—it was harder now that everyone had their own families or lives—and loved throwing a party even more.

“Bring Kylie, we invite some friends from the neighbourhood,” her mom continues, not expecting a response from Amy.

“Yeah, I’ll ask,” she tells her, not thinking much about the _fiesta_. It was her mom’s favourite thing to do; cook food for people, dance under the coloured lights Joseph set up for her and drink rum while settled under her dad’s arm.

They chat a little more after that and when Amy hangs up, she smiles at the thought of having a good old party in the Santiago backyard; family fiestas were always her favourite memories in that household.

 

\--

 

It’s an ambush. She should have seen it earlier.

She didn’t pay much mind to her mom’s suggestion to invite Kylie and her comment that she would invite ‘friends’ from the neighbourhood. She should have been suspicious when it was open to people beyond her family. She didn’t think her mom would invite Jake’s nana. She definitely didn’t think her mom would invite Karen and Jake.

It’s been a few weeks since that dinner where his name came up for the first time in years, so it’s understandable that Amy _assumed_ that her mom had forgotten about the whole idea.

She was wrong.

Never had she been so wrong.

“Amy!” There’s a chorus of male voices as soon as she steps through the glass sliding door into the Santiago backyard.

She rolls her eyes half-heartedly at that; her brothers have been doing that ever since she started high school and her brothers wanted to embarrass her on her first day, as well as warn any boy who wanted to try something with their baby sis.

Dating was hard in high school to say the least.

Amy hugs her mom first, with one hand because she’s carrying a large platter of empanadas towards a table they’ve got set up for food near the door, and then a quick kiss on the cheek for dad who smiles at her but continues speaking to one of his old workmates.

She proceeds to greet the various aunties, uncles, grandparents, friends, neighbours, who have managed to make it down for an impromptu party, and waves at the babies and kids. Her next destination is the kitchen, to help her mum with bringing out the food.

She stops when she finds Karen standing there, helping her mum take out freshly made tamales.

“Hi Amy!” She greets enthusiastically. She stops her task to walk towards her and hugs her tightly. “It’s been so long.”

“Yeah,” Amy can only reply lamely. She feels as if a curve ball has been thrown at her. A nasty feeling settles deep in the pit of her stomach.

“I have to bring these out, but I’ll talk to you later?” She asks, not really waiting for a response and walks out to the backyard, tamales in hand.

“Sure,” Amy replies after her, but her spins around to glare at her mom. “ _Ma_ , what did you do?”

Her mom just smiles at her and picks up a flan—her mom really went all out for this. “I figured I might as well invite Karen, Jake and his _abuela_. Now you can talk to him about a place to live.”

She leaves her then and Amy immediately pours herself two fingers of rum. She takes a sip and leans against the kitchen counter, taking her time with the drink. She doesn’t want to go out there and potentially run into Jake, so she’s happy to spend most of the party inside. Maybe she could play with her niece and all the kids.

But of course life doesn’t work that way, because Jake enters then, a cup of _Arroz con Leche_ in hand. Amy figures her mom must have sent him in to talk to her.

He’s obviously older now, but his hair is still curly like it used to be and not as long as when he was a kid, just curling around his collar and ears. It’s annoying to look at.

He’s in sneakers, dark jeans and a blue plaid shirt thrown over a dark t-shirt. He looks exactly how Amy would imagine an adult Jake Peralta to look like except she’s surprised that his Nikes look somewhat expensive.

She keeps her expression neutral and wishes Kylie didn’t convince her to wear the floral dress—on the basis that she might meet someone.

“It’s a family gathering,” Amy tells Kylie, as she eyes the dress in Kylie’s hands.

“But you have seven brothers. I’m sure _one_ of them is bound to bring a cute friend,” she tells hers. “Plus, this is my favourite item of clothing you actually own and you don’t wear it enough.”

It falls just above her knees and the loose, ruffled sleeves are too delicate to appropriately express the annoyance she can feel building inside her. She wishes for jeans and her heeled boots so she would feel taller and tougher than her soft dress and sandals.

“Amy Santiago.” He says her name slowly and smiles broadly. His voice is deeper but there’s the same goofy quality to it.

Amy takes a sip of her rum casually and looks at him. She doesn’t move from her spot, keeps her right arm crossed under her left and her glass near her face. She gives him a smile that feels like a smirk. “Hey, Pineapples.”

He shakes his head, but she can see a hint of a smile. “As if you remember that.”

“How could I not?” She counters, raising an eyebrow. “I’d never forget any bit of information that would cause you embarrassment.”

He presses a hand to his heart. “You’d never forget me Santiago? I’m touched.”

She rolls her eyes and takes another drink, this one just _a bit_ longer than the others. “What are you doing here, weirdo?”

Jake grabs a beer from the fridge, twists it open and drops the lid into the trash. The recycling she notes, a little impressed, but doesn’t tell him that.

“As if I could miss a party,” he replies after taking a drink. “And a party at the Santiago’s?”

Amy smirks again. “Yeah, my mom is the best cook and we do throw the best parties in the street.”

Jake chuckles at that and regards her thoughtfully.

She prickles under his gaze. “What.”

He shakes his head slightly. “You still write lists for everything?”

Amy says nothing at the jab and doesn’t point out that she now creates binders; she doesn’t want to give any more reason for him to tease her.

“You still eat gummy bears for breakfast?” She asks instead.

He smiles. “I see you haven’t changed.”

“I see you haven’t either,” she responds.

They quiet at that, sipping their own respective drinks and Amy is desperate to get out of there, but Jake’s blocking the exit and she considers going through the front door and going to the backyard that way.

She doesn’t know if he knows about her mom’s suggestion about being his roommate and she certainly doesn’t want to bring it up, but there’s a burning curiosity for what he thinks about the whole suggestion.

It makes her want to laugh.

“What’s funny?” He asks, still watching her.

She realises he’s been watching her the whole time.

“Oh,” Amy stutters out embarrassed she actually laughed out loud. “Just this crazy suggestion my mom had.”

He looks at her, waiting for the rest and she sighs when she realises she has to elaborate now.

“She bumped into your mom the other day and your mom mentioned that you’re looking for a roommate,” she explains. “And since I’m now out of college and my lease is up, she suggested to me that I should move in with you.”

She laughs again then, expecting him to join in but when she looks at him, he’s just smiling at her.

She can read the look on his face. “No.”

“I didn’t even say anything!” He exclaims.

Amy shakes her head and points a finger at him. “I see right through you. There’s no way it would work. We would clash!”

He sets his now empty beer down by the edge of the counter where he’s leaning his hip against the counter. He folds his arms and turns to her completely, still casually leaning against the counter. “You don’t know that.”

“Yeah I do,” Amy tells him. Her drink is finished now, so she sets it down and doesn’t pour herself another. She knows that she shouldn’t have any more since it’s a family event and she’s always been a lightweight. She knows that she’ll be spacey in an hour or so.

“When we were kids, we clashed over everything. You would mix my markers, rearrange my shelf and pull my plaits. In high school you would draw in the margins of my book when I was doing homework, distract me when doing homework and you once snuck into my bedroom at two in the morning.” She gives him a look and he just grins stupidly at her.

“Ah, fond memories,” he sighs out loud. “And only because I misjudged which room to sneak into and was supposed to be sneaking into Luis’ room. I told my mom and Nana I was staying with him. And how do you know I haven’t grown up?”

Amy studies him before answering. “You’re having dessert before we’ve even eaten, which tells me you still have that ridiculously sweet tooth. There’s a hole at the bottom of your shirt _and_ some sort of stain, so you’re still messy as ever.”

Jake laughs and grabs another beer from the fridge. “Yeah, your brothers mentioned you wanna be a detective.”

Amy shakes her head. “Not just a detective—“

“A captain,” Jake finishes for her.

“Yeah,” Amy replies, taken aback by how much he knows about her. Damn brothers. They’re silent for a while and Amy feels the need to fill the silence with polite questions—a habit she had ingrained into her by her parents. “How’s being a beat cop?”

Jake shrugs and takes a drink. “It’s okay, they don’t have you doing much when you start out, so might take a while before I start doing serious work.”

Amy nods, unsure what else to say. She points to the door behind Jake. “We should probably go back out. Apparently Luis has big news.”

“Yeah, sure,” Jake agrees. He moves out of the way to let Amy pass through and follows her out the door.

They’ve re-entered the party the right time because Amy’s mom is gathering everyone around where Luis is standing in the middle of the yard, holding a flute of champagne.

His girlfriend is standing by his side and Amy’s already forgotten Jake and the roommate ordeal because she now knows what this whole party was for and smiles in anticipation for the news.

“We’re getting hitched!” Luis cries out and lifts Isabelle’s hand where Amy can see a ring catching the sun’s rays.

Amy calls out with the rest of the party and Jakes is cheering obnoxiously loudly next to her. She stares at him with an eyebrow raised, but he grins at her and salutes her. “Captain.”

“Get outta here, weirdo,” she tells him.

“Only if you admit that calling you captain was totally a turn on,” he tells her seriously.

“Urgh,” she scoffs. She punches him in the shoulder. “Don’t be gross.”

“Forgot how hard you punch,” he mumbles, rubbing his arm.

She walks off then and smirks at him over her shoulder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any of you guys on Tumblr? I'm back on it again and currently draining my feed with B99 gifs and posts (sorrynotsorry). I'm askflowerchild22!
> 
> I am also so behind on the current season because I've moved to Germany and have no idea if they air the series straight from the US and in English, so I am also trying to avoid all things B99 for spoilers.


	3. Group Chats

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylie is cheeky, Amy's mom is persistent and Marcos is a traitor.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a filler but there should be some Jake and Amy interaction next chapter...I think.
> 
> Enjoy!

“It’s terrible Kylie,” Amy groans into her coffee. “Terrible.”

Kylie laughs at her from over her menu. “I guess being a hooker doesn’t seem so bad an idea now?”

Amy just glares at Kylie while taking a sip. She skims the menu briefly, trying to decide if she wanted a big breakfast after eating so much at the party yesterday.

“Who is he again? And is he cute?” Kylie asks cheekily.

Amy groans again. “Let’s not talk about Jake that way. His grandmother lived on my street and he was friends with a few of my brothers. Mainly Luis.”

“But is he cute?” Kylie repeats.

Amy ignores her and continues to sip her coffee like it’s her lifeline. “I think I might have eggs on toast. Scrambled or poached? Scrambled? Or poached?”

Kylie narrows her eyes at the Latina. “I’m gonna assume he is and you don’t want to admit it so you’re now ignoring me.”

“I think I’ll have scrambled,” Amy says with finality. “And a slice of bacon.”

“Amy,” Kylie chides.

“Yes?” She asks innocently, setting her menu down.

Kylie snorts. “Real mature.”

Amy just pouts at her menu.

Kylie drops her menu down and settles her hands on top of it. “So, my last day in New York.”

A soft smile replaces the stubborn pout on Amy’s face. “I still can’t believe you’re leaving me. For the west coast too! The betrayal hurts, Kylie.”

Kylie playfully shoves her ballet flat against Amy’s shin under the table. “You’ll live.”

“Yeah, I will,” Amy agrees dejectedly.

Kylies laughs. “Have you found any places to live yet?”

Amy sighs and settles back in her chair. “No, nothing. I’ve went to at least five places last week and nothing.”

“Awww,” Kylie croons in sympathy. “I’m sure you’ll find something soon.”

“Maybe my standards are too high,” Amy shrugs.

Kylie laughs at that and waves the waitress over to take their order. “Your standards are always too high.”

Amy tosses a sugar packet at Kylie’s head and Kylie is still giggling when the waitress stops by their booth.

“What can I get you ladies?” She asks, noting down their table number on her pad.

“Scrambled eggs on toast and a slice of bacon please,” Amy tells her, offering the laminated sticky menu to the waitress. She discreetly wipes her hands on her jeans. 

“Anything to drink, sugar?” The waitress asks Amy who just shakes her head in reply.

“Just coffee and a glass of water,” she replies.

Kylie is still staring at her menu and biting her nail. “I’ll have. . .the tomato and mushroom omelette and a glass of orange juice to drink.”

“Won’t be long,” the waitress tells the women and goes to ring up their order.

Amy’s in the middle of telling Kylie about one woman she had gone to interview for at an apartment in Brooklyn, where the apartment had only one bedroom but the woman attempted to convince her to sleep in the living room when their food arrives and Kylie watches in amusement when Amy starts to dig in enthusiastically.

“That is hilarious,” Kylie comments, cutting into her omelette and taking a bite. “How is it possible that you have been to 5 bad apartment interviews in a row?”

Amy shakes her head. “It’s impossible. It’s either perfect but too far to reasonably commute to the academy or it’s close by and I’m meant to live in a living room.”

“You haven’t considered living with Jake at all?” Kylie asks tentatively.

Amy glares at Kylie. “It’s just—it’s _Jake_. I couldn’t stand him growing up, how am I supposed to even consider living with him? He’s a man-child.”

Kylie shrugs. “You don’t know that. Maybe give him a chance? Or at least check out his place?”

“It feels like I’m going to have to,” Amy groans, dropping her chin into her palm. “I’ve barely got two weeks left on our lease. It’s either that, live with my parents or hope for a miracle.”

\--

“Remember that Rafael’s baby shower is on—“

“ _Sabado,_ ” Amy finishes for her mom. “I know.”

“I saw that you spoke to Jacob on Saturday,” Amy’s mom comments, spooning _ropa vieja_ onto Amy’s plate.

Amy can barely afford the take-out she eats on a daily basis; now that she has to potentially settle for a place much pricier than she had hoped for and finds herself agreeing to have dinner with her parents more times in the past week than she had over the last year.

It also gives her mom more chances to push the Jake agenda every single time Amy is over for dinner.

“Yeah,” Amy replies slowly.

“I sent him to talk to say hi,” her mom supplies, smiling as if she was being helpful.

Amy’s jaw clenches—she was right, her mom did plan some sort of ambush—and feigns a smile. “Oh, did you?”

“How did it go? Did he ask you to move in with him?” Her mom asks.

Amy takes a sip of her water and shakes her head. “Oh no, we just chatted. Caught up.”

“ _Niña_! Why didn’t you ask?” Her mom scolds.

“ _Ma_ , I told you,” she groans in exasperation. “It’s awkward. And we didn’t get along as kids, so I don’t think it’s a good idea that we live together. We’ve barely seen each other since he finished high school.”

“Only six years,” her mom tells her like six years isn’t a big deal. “I had always thought he had a crush on you.”

Amy’s mouth drops down. “Um, _no_. He definitely _did not_.”

Her mom just smiles in response.

Amy’s dad stays quiet throughout the whole exchange except when he grunted unimpressed at the large pile of green beans her mom had piled onto his plate. He eats them dejectedly and gives Amy a horrified look.

Amy chuckles at that and shakes her head. “They’re good for you, _papi_.”

He grumbles at that and stabs one with his fork. “My _abuelo_ never had to eat beans. He lived until 90.”

“He also was struggling for years from all the cigars,” his wife points out. She then turns her attention back to her only daughter. “He’s a nice boy, give him a chance.”

“I’ll try,” Amy mutters eventually, if only to appease her mom.

\--

Amy ends up staying the night because she can’t be bothered driving back to Manhattan and she missed her childhood bedroom.

It looks exactly the same from when she had left it to go to college; where she had stuck up posters of _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_ and _Nsync_ as a kid growing up as a way to claim the room as completely hers once it was only her, Marcos and Luis left in the house. The sheets are still the girly floral sheets that were gifted to her from her Tía Louisa—her parents didn’t bother much with giving the rest of the kids new sheets after Dominic and she cherished those sheets because they weren’t Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Batman—and her senior textbooks are still alphabetically arranged on her shelf by the desk.

To her surprise Marcos, the youngest of her older brothers, arrives the next morning for breakfast and dirty laundry.

“Dude, you are way too old to be bringing home laundry for mom to wash,” Amy snorts when she spots her brother in the living room with a laundry basket.

“Nice to see you too sis,” Marcos greets with over the top sweetness. “And I’m not here to make mom wash my laundry. My plumbing is out for the weekend, I’m here to wash my _own_ clothes. Like a real adult. What are you doing here?”

Amy laughs and shakes her head. “Spent the night. Missed my old room, y’know?”

Marcos snorts. “So you came here to get fed?”

Amy pouts and crosses her arms stubbornly. “No.”

Marcos just laughs and walks towards her to drop a kiss on her head. “Still can’t cook?”

Amy juts her chin out. “No.”

“Ah Amy,” Marcos sighs affectionately. “Never change.”

Amy rolls her eyes and picks up the basket. “Okay, let’s go wash your dirty laundry.”

Marcos grins and ruffles her hair, but Amy dodges out his way and shoots him a dirty look.

 

“You’re going to a Mets game with whom?” Amy asks Marcos, unable to believe the words coming out of his mouth. The shirt she was in the middle of folding drops of out her hands in disbelief.

Marcos gives her look for her proper grammar. Amy smirks briefly; she only really bothers with proper grammar around her brothers. As a kid it annoyed Marcos that Amy had skipped a grade and ended up the same year level.

“Jake,” he tells her simply, not paying her much attention.

“As in Jake Peralta?” She asks incredulously. “We hate Jake Peralta!”

“Um, no, _you_ hate Jake Peralta.” Marcos holds up a finger and walks around her to enter the kitchen. Amy spins around on her heel to follow him.

Amy is unable to do anything but stare at her brother and with a look that looks like their mother’s you-did-not-just-do-that face. “But why? And since when are you friends?”

Marcos rolls his eyes at his younger sister’s dramatics. “Don’t be so melodramatic _niña._ ”

Amy glares at him—her brothers liked using _niña_ to spite her during arguments—and crosses her arms. Marcos sighs at the sight of his stubborn sister and drops his hands on her shoulders.

“Amy,” he says softly, with a gentle smile on his face. “I think we’re all old enough now to leave behind childhood rivalries. Jake’s actually a pretty cool guy. He would be decent if you gave him a chance.”

Amy’s glares turns into a pout; she cannot believe that Marcos, of all people, is lecturing her about being mature and setting aside childish fights.

“Fine, go to your dumb game with Peralta,” she huffs out and uncrosses her arms to point at Marcos. “But don’t lecture me on childish fights. I _know_ for a fact that you still play pranks on Leon Andreadis from down the street.”

Marcos tries to be angry at Amy, but he can’t help but smile; Amy’s memory was always too good to trick and there is no doubt she would make captain one day. “Okay fine, I take it back. Andreadis is too much of an asshole though. But you can’t stop Jake being friends with us, even if you hate each other.”

Amy nods her agreement with the Andreadis statement—he was a dick, he had tried hitting on Amy when she was fourteen—but concedes. “Okay, you’re right. I will not, however, agree to being friends with Jake. And what do you mean about ‘us’?”

Marcos gives her his impish smile again and steps away from her, quickly reaching for the packet of chips on the bench and backing out of the kitchen. “We might, sorta, have a group chat with him?”

“We?” Amy asks, her voice dangerously low.

“You know, me, Carlos, Dominic, Luis, Rey, Mateo, Rafael…” he trails off and then dashes away from Amy before she can lecture him further. “We love you Amy!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also have totally made up Amy's brothers' names and potentially been a little stereotypical about them buuut I can't remember if they're all named in the show. If know any please let me know and I can fix it!


	4. Polaroids, Old Mustangs and Baby Showers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Amy can't seem to escape Jake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first part of this chapter was were it all started. I was sitting at doctors waiting for at least an hour just to update a prescription and somehow my exasperation led to Amy's exasperation in a Target. 
> 
> I did change the rating but: Language warning.
> 
> Enjoy my little blueberries! (This chapter might be a little choppy but it all fits together.)

“Ay-Me!”

Amy takes a deep breath and stares up at the ceiling as if calling to some higher entity for strength.

“Fucking Christ,” she mutters under her breath, beyond exasperated with everything the world is throwing at her.

It’s a good thing that she’s an atheist—but don’t tell Great Aunty Benita that—because it seems like God or whoever the fuck is up there is seriously out to get her.

She closes her eyes and counts to five as calmly as she can and she can already sense the shit eating grin on his stupid face.

“Hey roomie,” he calls out behind her.

She can hear his sneakers squeaking towards her across the linoleum floor. She spins around, hands on her hips in classic Amy SantiagoTM style and gives him a sardonic smile. “We are not roomies.”

“Not yet,” he replies, giving her an easy grin.

“What are you doing here?” She asks instead of arguing him on it. “Stalking me?”

He holds up the box of wine glasses in his hand and he is still grinning at her. “Shopping for our new place.”

The look she gives him is unimpressed and she says nothing but stares him down. His grin doesn’t drop and he just laughs at her.

“My mom is holding a dinner for her nurse friends and wanted me to pick up more wine glasses. Apparently nurses like drinking, who would’ve thought?”

Amy just nods at him and starts to head towards the baby section.

“What are you doing here?” He asks her, eyes flickering to where she’s turned.

Amy sighs and turns back. She can’t get rid of him that quickly. “Baby section. Rafael is having a boy.”

“Cool. Cool, cool, cool,” he replies, apparently with nothing else to say.

Amy takes that as her cue to leave him. She turns towards the baby section and walks off without saying anything else and she’s walked a couple of steps when she slows down and notices Jake following her.

“Do you need anything else?” She asks annoyed.

Jake grins and holds up a hand. “Amy, I know that you are probably nerdy enough to be mistaken for a worker here—”

He gestures at her black polo shirt and khaki pants which she looks down and glares at him. She about to point out that the uniform for Target is a _red_ polo shirt and that she’s about to head to her dinner shift at her second job, but he continues to talk.

“—but as it so happens, I was also invited to Rafael’ baby-shower-celebration-thing and need to look for a gift myself.”

Amy presses her lips into a thin line and walks towards the baby section in silence while Jake chats about unimportant things beside her.

Once they reach the baby blue and pink area—which she crinkles her nose at the entire section—she immediately separates from Jake and starts to look at the bottles. While it’s all well and good to buy some ‘cute’ baby onesies, it was much more _practical_ to buy something Rafael needed, instead of adding to the inevitable pile of onesies Rafael and Liliana are bound to receive.

She’s finally found the one she researched and read reviews for online when a middle aged woman approaches her with a box of nappies.

“Excuse me, I was just wondering if this was included in the catalogue promotion?” She asks earnestly and Amy almost goes to find the answer for the woman despite not actually being a Target employee.

She purposely avoids looking at Jake, who she knows is most likely trying to hold in a laugh and instead gives the woman an apologetic smile. “Sorry ma’am, I don’t work here.”

She even points to the Applebee’s logo printed on her left breast and the woman takes a minute to read the logo and then suddenly realises that Amy is in fact in a black polo shirt and _not_ the red polo of the Target staff.

“Oh,” she says, looking embarrassed. “I’m so sorry dear. I don’t know why I didn’t notice the colour of your shirt.”

“It’s fine,” Amy tells her, waving the woman off. She’s about to add, _it happens all the time_ , when she stops herself because she doesn’t want to give Jake any more reason to tease her.

The woman heads towards someone else who is actually a Target employee and Amy doesn’t bother to wait for Jake before she heads towards the registers.

“Oh my god, _that_ was hilarious!” Jake cries out beside her, easily keeping up with Amy’s fast pace. Damn her shorter legs. “I know I just joked about it but—“

He bursts into laughter again but Amy holds her ground and refuses to stop walking.

“Why are you wearing that anyway?” Jake asks once his laughter dies down. There’s still his stupid, goofy smile on his face and Amy feels her hand clench by her side with the urge to smack it off.

“I like wearing restaurant uniforms,” she answers sarcastically. “You’re a cop, figure it out dummy.”

Jake laughs again and shakes his head. “Did you just call me a dummy?”

“If you must know,” she tells him snidely, stopping in her tracks. “I’m a waitress at Applebee’s.”

Jake cocks his head to the side. “I thought you worked at a gallery?”

“I do,” she confirms. She starts to fiddle with the box of bottles in her hands. “From 11 to 6 during the week. I pick up evening and weekend shifts at Applebee’s for extra money. Being a college student in New York is expensive.”

Jake nods understandingly. “I get you. I’m actually in debt.”

Amy nods at that, unsure of what else to say. They start walking towards the registers again.

“Actually,” he adds, “soul crushing debt.”

She rolls her eyes at him, but she manages to smile a little at that, because _of course_ Jacob Peralta is terrible with money.

\--

“Now that we’re roomies,” Jake says to Amy and she lifts an eyebrow at him. “Do you want to head to Rafael’s’ together?”

“I never agreed to be your roommate,” Amy corrects. She has one hand on her door handle and the other against her door frame so he can’t peer inside her apartment. “But, yeah sure, whatever.”

Jake nods again and Amy is itching to leave him and escape into the privacy of her _Jake-free_ apartment, but he doesn’t make any move to leave. When she thinks about it, she’s not entirely sure why and how Jake ended up walking her back to her apartment.

“So this is where you live huh?” He asks, trying to peer over her shoulder.

Amy sighs and looks behind her. “For the next week or so at least.”

She drops her arm and steps out of the doorway to let Jake in, but he’s already making his way into the living room and looking around.

She’s surprised that he doesn’t immediately start touching everything and stays in the general entrance area, taking a slow sweep of the joined kitchen and living room space.

The apartment is tidy but looks strange—at least to Amy—because Kylie’s already sent boxes of her stuff ahead and so all the Kylie-knick-knacks, like her useless souvenir trinkets that she had collected that one time she and Amy had driven to the west coast for their summer break, are already packed and on their way to the west coast. They divided all photos of them and their friends equally so Amy still has Polaroids on the fridge and wall by their door and framed photos on the shelves.

Amy smiles at the mug of Kylie’s unfinished coffee on their coffee table and two empty glasses of wine—red for Amy, white for Kylie—next to a trashy magazine Amy was handed at the station and they spent the night drinking wine and laughing at the stupid articles.

Jake’s staring at the Polaroids by their front door now and there’s a small smile on his face, which Amy doesn’t notice, when he looks at each of them with great detail.

He laughs and points to one where Amy is frowning at the camera and Kylie sits next to her grinning and posing for the camera. The reason for Amy’s frown is the oversized—very likely—jock sitting next to her with his arm thrown around her.

Amy looks at the photo and sighs. “Kylie was meant to take that one with her.”

Jake looks at her with a raised eyebrow knowing there’s a story behind the photo.

Amy sighs again. “That’s Josh Byrant. He was some star football player at our college. Basically, he always tried to hit on me at parties. Not really sure why, I’m far from his type.”

Jake turns back to the photos to continue studying the pictures. “He’s a jock. Pretty girl is his type.”

He says the comment so casually that Amy thinks that he doesn’t realise what he’s just said so she ignores it and instead heads to the kitchen to distract herself from feeling pleased and horrified at the comment.

“Do you want a drink?” She asks over her shoulder. She opens the fridge and stares at its pathetic contents. There’s one apple and a jug of water; she hasn’t bothered to go shopping after Kylie officially moved out. The freezer only has ice cubes and there’s still half a bottle of red wine on the counter from the other night.

Jake shakes his head and continues to survey the room with open curiosity as if he was in a museum or a gallery.

He picks up the empty vase and doily underneath it by the front door. “Three things: why is this vase so empty? Why is it on top of a doily? Are you eighty years old?”

Amy waits until he’s put the vase down and moved away from it to throw a cushion at his head. “Shut up.”

“We tried flowers for a while but the smell used to give me a headache and the doily was a gift from my grandma,” Amy explains begrudgingly. She doesn’t admit that she actually bought the doily at a thrift store because she had actually liked it and thought it would match the vase.

“Yeah, sure,” Jake mutters under his breath and he ducks to dodge the second pillow thrown at his head.

She hits in the face and laughs at his expression. He’s stopped near the hallway where the bathroom and bedrooms are and he points towards it. “Oh, I _have_ to see how grandma your bedroom looks.”

“Nooo,” she tells him, blocking his path towards her room. “It is time for you to leave.”

She places her hands on his back and pushes him towards the front door and he whines to her but allows himself to be pushed out of her apartment.

He stops just outside her door and turns to face her and points at her. “I _will_ see this bedroom.”

Amy rolls her eyes and slowly closes the door in his face. “ _Goodbye_ Peralta.”

\--

Amy meets Jake on the corner outside her apartment building, holding her neatly wrapped baby bottles and he’s already there by the time she’s climbed down the steps of her building.

She claps to the best of her ability and nods at Jake. “You’re actually on time. I gotta say, I’m impressed.”

Jake takes a bow. “Thank you, thank you. I’d take all the credit but I accidentally set my alarm an hour before.”

“So, basically at the time you should?” She asks condescendingly.

“Pfft,” Jake waves her off. “Don’t be ridiculous. No one does that.”

“Uh no,” Amy interrupts. “Everyone does. Like every functional adult.”

Jake ignores her and tugs Amy gently alongside him. She tries to shake him off but he’s persistent and leads her around the corner where his old Mustang is parked. “Lady, your chariot awaits you.”

“I dare you to spell chariot,” Amy smirks at him, before turning to look at his car.

Any comeback Jake is about to tell her is interrupted by her groan of horror. “How do you still own this old piece of _junk_?”

Jake drops her arm and rushes to his car. She can hear him say, “Don’t worry, she wasn’t talking about you.”

Amy stays where she’s standing, wrinkling her nose at the old car. It looks exactly as she remembered; when Jake had driven down her street and tooted obnoxiously as Luis cheered him on and a thirteen year old Amy watched on in disgust. Surprisingly it managed to keep its black paint intact all these years but she did see a few scratches alongside the tyre rims and front bumper.

“This car was probably older than you are now when you bought it,” Amy comments, still watching Jake pat his car reassuringly.

“This car,” Jake announces dramatically. “Was a chick magnet.”

“Oh yeah totally,” she replies, nodding sarcastically. “Especially that old cheese smell that never disappeared. I’m sure that got _all the ladies_.”

Jake nods defensively, trying to mock Amy but she places a finger on her chin.

“Tell me, did it impress that girl from your Bar Mitzvah? What was her name again?” She asks teasingly.

Jake points at her. “Do _not_ bring that up.”

“Oh that’s right,” Amy replies, ignoring him. “Jenny Gildenhorn.”

“Amy,” Jake warns her.

Amy just smirks at him. “She chose Eddie Fung over you, right?”

“That’s it!” Jake cries, climbing into the driver’s seat. “You’re walking.”

“Trust me,” she tells him, holding a hand up. “That would be an _upgrade_ to your car.”

\--

Jake and Amy eventually arrive at Rafael’s house in the outer suburbs of New Jersey; it took Amy a good ten minutes to talk herself into entering Jake’s car which wasn’t helped when Amy noticed a donut in his cup holder. It especially didn’t help when he mentioned it was from a week ago.

They’re standing on Rafael’s doorstep and Amy’s trying to brush off the crumbs she knows is from sitting in Jake’s passenger seat and while Jake tries to hide the nappies behind his back to surprise Rafael and Liliana.

“Amy! Jake!” Liliana greets, slightly surprised. She doesn’t comment further over the strangeness of Jake and Amy arriving together. She waves them in and Rafael joins her to greet their new guests.

“Ta-da!” Jake cries enthusiastically, revealing the nappies he had hidden behind his back.

“Oh Jake!” Liliana says to him, slightly confused. “You didn’t have to when you already dropped off those bibs!”

Jake coughs awkwardly at that and dumps the nappies in Rafael’ hands. He points towards the backyard, avoiding Amy’s confused face. “Don’t worry about it. Babies are expensive. I’m going to go get a drink.”

Amy watches him retreat to the back of the house and turns back to Liliana just in time to be swept into her arms and squeezed. “Thank you so much Amy!”

“You are the first one to give something other than onesies,” she adds in a low voice. “Honestly, I don’t think we’ll even end up using all of these clothes.”

Amy laughs at that and pulls back, taking the nappies from Rafael, who shoots her a relieved smile, and places the presents by the ever-growing pile of baby things in the lounge room. “No problem! And these are a reliable brand, I made sure to check a number of reputable forums.”

Rafael just gives her an affectionate shove on the shoulder and a, “Nerd,” and Liliana just kisses her on the cheek.

She thinks about Jake’s awkward face but has no time to reflect on it because she’s getting swept up a tight hug from her _abuela_ who is asking if she’s been eating enough and feels too thin.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long weekend this weekend (yay!) so I'll be headed to Berlin and can't guarantee that I'll be able to work on the next update, but travelling always inspires me so hopefully I can get to writing as soon as I get back!
> 
> Also, there was a name reference in here cause I'm unoriginal and can't think of a name. Brownie points for who can guess the movie!


	5. Galleries, Pierogi and Peanuts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jake weasels his way into accompanying Amy's gallery night. The night ends in peanuts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a point of view change halfway through which I've denoted with a double scene spacer (. . .). I hope it isn't too confusing!
> 
> Enjoy, lovelies!

Amy frowns down at the phone in her hand when it starts ringing in her hand while she checks the labels on the artwork hanging on the blank white walls. It’s an unknown number and she can’t think of any reason why anyone would ever mistake ringing the wrong phone but the polite side of her wants to answer and apologise to the caller _but sorry you have the wrong number_.

“Hello,” she answers neutrally.

“Hi, Amy Santiago? I’m calling from the New York Public Library and have here on record that you’re overdue in returning a book,” comes the reply, but Amy immediately recognises the goofy voice.

“I know it’s you Peralta,” she replies, rolling her eyes. “And I always return my books a week early.”

“Of course you do,” he answers, but he doesn’t sound mocking and Amy thinks she might hear amusement in his voice.

She sighs. “How’d you get this number?”

“I was visiting my nana just yesterday, like the perfect grandson I am, and ran into your mom in the front yard as she was gardening,” he tells her, perfectly candid and polite. “Her petunias are blooming beautifully by the way.”

“One,” Amy starts, “my mom doesn’t have petunias and it’s the middle of the summer. And two, get to the point.”

“Your mom mentioned that you had a gallery showcase this Friday night and thought it would be great if you brang me along!”

“Brought,” Amy corrects automatically. She can hear him chuckle at that but she ignores him. “And of course my mom thinks it’s perfectly fine handing my number out to random people.”

“Random people? Amy, that hurts!” He gasps. She can picture him dramatically holding his hand to his chest. “And I am disappointed and appalled that you didn’t think to invite me to your gallery showcase!”

“Even if we were good enough friends for me to even invite you in the _first place_ ,” Amy begins, “it would not be your scene _at all_.”

“I’m offended,” Jake tell her again.

Amy snorts. “I’m sure you are. A gallery night is sophisticated and intellectual.”

“I’m sophisticated and intellectual!” He cries indignantly.

Amy sighs out loud and chews on the side of her mouth, thinking. “You really want to go to this?”

“Yes, I really do,” Jake responds sincerely.

There’s a pause before Amy finally lets out a deep breath, unable to believe she’s about to invite Jake to one of her gallery nights. As much as she enjoys discussing the intricacies of a painting or a photograph, the showcases tend to run quite long and Amy always eventually ends up being sick and tired of speaking to artists and art lovers.

“Fine, you may accompany as my guest.”

“Yes—“

“ _But_ ,” she interrupts Jake’s celebratory cheer. “I have rules—“

“Of course you do—“

“—and you _have_ to follow them. For real. This is my job, Peralta.”

“You have my word.”

Amy’s surprised to find that he sounds completely genuine over the phone.

“My lady, I promise that I will be nothing but a complete gentleman,” he tells her in a posh accent.

Amy rolls her eyes and doesn’t bother to say goodbye, but she’s smiling when she turns back to the painting in front of her.

. . .

Amy’s already at the gallery from setting up, having gotten dressed quickly in the gallery office, starting to feel her palms sweat a little at the prospect of having Jake Peralta at one of her gallery’s galas. She tries to tell herself that it’s in anxiety at all the disasters she’ll have to inevitably navigate during the night.

She wipes her palms on the little black dress she’s wearing; it’s a long enough length that it’s still professional, but there’s a skirt that fans out which she secretly enjoys because it reminds her of when she was little and she used to salsa with her dad in their living room. Her make up is simple but she decided at the last minute to use the bright red lipstick Kylie had insisted she keep permanently in her bag. She has her hair pulled back into a low bun at the base of her neck from earlier in the day, just to keep it out of her face and easier to attach the labels by the paintings.

She feels grown up and elegant, for the first time in her life and for once feels a little more comfortable and in her element, despite her nerves.

But they’re definitely _not_ for Jake Peralta _._

“You look exquisite,” a terrible formal voice sounds from behind her and she turns to see Jake holding two glasses of red wine with one presented to her.

She laughs him off but there’s a small jolt in her heart at the words. “Thank you, sir. Have you had a chance to peruse the collection?”

“No, I have not yet had the chance,” Jake continues with the posh accent.

“I’m sure we can find something you might like,” Amy responds, holding a hand towards a nearby painting and guides him to it.

She’s impressed that he’s followed her instructions to dress up formally; he’s in a navy suit, a pale blue shirt and a pink and blue striped tie. If Amy had to guess, she would have assumed that he would have a general black and white ensemble, but at the same time it’s no surprise that fun, goofy Jake would wear as much colour as possible, even in formal wear.

“You look nice,” she comments lightly, focusing on the painting in front of them.

She can see him shrug beside her. “Rule number one was not to embarrass you. It’s painful, but I’m getting through it.”

Amy rolls her eyes and turns to greet a passing guest.

“You look nice too,” he tells her after a moment.

Amy turns back to him distractedly and gives him a smile. “Thanks.”

She quickly turns back to the guests and misses the soft look on Jake’s face.

. . .

. . .

“So how come when you visited my apartment, you looked at everything with curious interest,” Amy asks him, grabbing two glasses of red wine and handing one to him, “but I take you to a gallery showcase night and you barely look at each piece for more than ten seconds?”

Jake shrugs and thinks that it’s probably a bad idea to tell her he finds her more interesting than the art surrounding them. To distract himself he twirls his wine around in his glass then smells it. In his younger years, he only knew how to drink beer and cheap spirits, but he was slowly learning to appreciate a fine wine. And at an event as fancy as Amy’s gallery showcase, the wine was _hella fine_.

“Ah!” He smacks his lips together after taking a small sip.

She’s looking at him amusedly and shakes her head. “You know, smacking your lips completely removes any sense of class.”

He grins goofily at her, to which she rolls her eyes but he thinks it’s a victory because he can see her smiling into her wine glass as she appreciates the photograph in front of her.

He takes and another sip and it turns into a large gulp and he stares at the glass. “Okay, I know you said this was going to be fancy, but this wine is _fucking amazing_. Like, probably worth more than my entire existence per bottle amazing.”

Amy leans towards him and gushes as well. “Oh my god, I know right? Have you tried the quiche? I want to stash a tray of them into my bag.”

Jake laughs at Amy’s silliness and takes a moment to watch her as she continues to appreciate the photograph they’ve stopped in front of. She’s standing similar to when he saw her at Luis’ engagement party—her right hand crossed under her left, with the glass near her mouth—except this time she’s not smirking at him and has a small content smile on her face.

He feels his own smile match hers, but then she turns to him and he tries to drop the smile on his face. Amy gives him a look and he can feel his heartbeat pick up in nervousness, but she doesn’t seem to think he was just staring at her like a fool and just gives him a look.

“You’re doing that staring thing you used to do when we were kids and you tried to hold your face as close to mine until I crack, aren’t you? I know you think this is boring Jake,” she tells him, “but can you at least wait until we’ve left the showcase to annoy me?”

Jake holds his hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay, you got me.”

He can feel his heart slamming fast, from the scare of Amy nearly catching him staring at her face.

He turns back to the photograph and gestures to it, trying to distract himself from Amy and her red lips. Her hair is pulled back low on her head and she looks so grown up that he’s reminded of when they were kids and she used to make the rules to all the games even though she was three years younger. Except, she’s wearing a little black dress with a skirt that fans out when she spins and he’s reminded of that time she was at his Bar Mitzvah and she was being twirled around on the dancefloor by one of her older brothers.

She’s pretty; it’s the only thing he keeps thinking when he looks at her.

It’s slowly killing him.

“So how much is this piece?” He asks her, immediately taking a large sip of his wine as not to start rambling and break any of her rules.

They’re quickly on their way to break her third rule which was not to drink too much wine, but the waiter keeps coming their way holding the tray of drinks in front of them and surprisingly they’re having so much fun at a sophisticated art gallery gala and he’s feeling content.

Amy tilts her head and quints at the painting. “Ummm, three thousand. I think.”

Jake nearly spits out his wine. “Are you serious?”

He looks back at the black and white photograph of two pigeons somewhere probably in central park and makes a face at it. “Three thousand. I could have done this!”

“And maybe you wouldn’t be in debt anymore,” Amy snarks back, grinning behind her glass.

He points a finger at her. “Don’t make me break rule four.”

Her eyes widen comically and she starts shaking her head frantically. “Don’t.”

He laughs and throws an arm around her and drags along to the next piece of artwork. “Oh, Amy. You’re too easy to prank.”

. . .

“As good as those quiches were,” Amy starts, stuffing a pierogi into her mouth, “there nearly weren’t enough to count as dinner.”

She’s talking with her mouth full, which Jake thinks is both characteristic and uncharacteristic of her. There’s that side of Amy where she could scold him for leaving the cap off her markers as kids and she sits on the subway with her right ankle elegantly under her left. But there’s also the side to Amy where she used to give her all in baseball games with her brothers and the kids in the neighbourhood and she would chant “winners” when propped onto two of her brother’s shoulders when they won.

The memory makes Jake smile.

“What’s funny?” Amy asks him, taking a sip of her beer.

Jake stuffs a dumpling into his mouth to stop the sentimental smile from breaking across his face. “Just remembered when we were kids and we used to play baseball with all the other kids in your street.”

Amy shakes her head. “I remember! That was the best!”

Jake snorts. “Of course you think that. You Santiagos were the most competitive and nearly always won.”

Amy laughs, clutching her chest. “Hey, you always somehow made it onto our team and I don’t remember you ever complaining about us carrying your pale ass to victory.”

Jake laughs along with her. “That is true.”

“I remember that Gina used to always come even though she would complain she hated it and would sit in the bleachers trying to tan her legs,” Amy reminisces.

“Yeah, only because she didn’t want to stay at home with my Nana and knit scarves all day,” Jake snorted, taking a large swig of his beer.

Amy throws down her fork onto their now empty plate and leans back in her booth chair and smiles contently. “Man, that was good.”

Jake laughs again and finishes off his beer and watches her. She stares back at him and then smiles. “What?”

Jake grins. “How much wine did you have, Ames? You’re kinda spacey.”

Amy groans and forces herself to sit up. “A few. I don’t remember. Plus this beer.”

He shakes his head and waves the waitress over for the bill. He checks the time on his phone and probably thinks it’s the fancy wine and cheap beer but he doesn’t want the night to end and comes up with a plan to keep the night going.

“What’s the time?” Amy asks him.

“Eleven-thirty,” he says. He chucks the correct amount plus a tip on the bill tray and grabs Amy’s hand without thinking and drags her out of the restaurant.

“Hey, where are you taking me?” Amy asks, but she’s laughing and running alongside him.

He turns to her and grins. “The night is still young, Miss Santiago.”

He tugs her along the street, trying to a fire hydrant with the KP + TY in a love heart drawn on it; he knows it’s along here somewhere but he’s not exactly sure where it is specifically.

“Do you even know where you’re going?” Amy asks him, still allowing herself to be dragged along New York’s streets and trying to dodge the party goers surrounding them on their way to a Friday night out.

“Yes,” he calls back. “Maybe.”

They turn a few streets and then he stops suddenly, causing Amy to bump into him. “There!”

He points at the fire hydrant and Amy squints at it, trying to figure out the significance of it. “KP and TY?”

She’s slightly out of breath and he realises that he is too after the adrenaline slows. It’s still pumping through his system, which gives him the courage to lead Amy to the nearby building.

“In here,” he directs her.

“O-kay,” she replies, following his instruction.

They clamber into the elevator and they stay quiet, giggling a little and smiling stupidly at each other the only way you can when you’re tipsy and filled with adrenaline.

They reach the last floor and Jake takes her up the stairs, taking them two at a time while she climbs fast behind him, trying to catch up.

He mutters a quick prayer before trying to turn the door handle and to his luck it opens and he lets Amy through before propping it closed with a brick.

She steps through slowly and takes in the rooftop around her, looking at the taller buildings around her.

“Behold, I give you—” he announces dramatically.

“A shitty view of New York?” She quips. “Rockerfeller would have been better for this.”

“Ha-ha,” he responds. “That may be, oh young one, but here we have zero tourists, zero queues and—“

She turns back to him as he pulls out a packet of peanuts out of his inner pocket.

“Peanuts!”

Amy looks at him, torn between humour and embarrassment. “Wait, have you been carrying a packet of _peanuts_ around with you this whole time?”

He shrugged and sat himself down on a makeshift bench of two crates and a wooden plank. “I didn’t know if the gallery was going to have food! I get snacky!”

He pats the seat next to him and she rolls his eyes and seats herself next to him, tucking her coat around her tighter. “Hand them over.”

He obliges and she starts popping them into her mouth and taking in the dirty buildings and drunken party goers in the street.

“Hand me a peanut,” he tells her.

She turns to him and raises a peanut at him; he turns fully towards her and readies himself for the throw. “Hit me.”

She throws it in the air towards him and it hits his nose before falling to the ground. She laughs at his confused face.

“I didn’t mean literally,” he tells her, but he’s smiling because she laughs more.

She holds another peanut up and this time throws it up above her head and he watches as she tries to lean towards it only to tip back a bit too far and miss the peanut completely.

It’s his turn to laugh but she only laughs along with him, her eyes crinkling in delight.

“Okay, I can do this,” she tells him.

“Okay, go,” he tells her.

She gives him a look before she throws the peanut up into the air again. This time she leans forwards and she manages to _just_ catch it between her lips.

“Ah,” she makes a sound of surprise and points at it before pushing it into her mouth. She gives him a smug grin and he can only give her a smile back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So long weekend ended up being two with a few normal ones in between haha, my bad. In the meantime I've been to Spain and Portugal and am already a third of the way through my internship!!
> 
> This is a pretty big jump emotions wise, in which we start to see Jake realise that maybe Amy isn't so bad...
> 
> Yes, the suit Jake is wearing if from that Thanksgiving ep in S1. And yes, I totally stole the peanut scene. I need to start including sex tape jokes and Amy's weird behaviour around Captain Holt...


	6. Soul Crushing Debt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Camilla plans another Santiago fiesta. Amy helps Jake out with his finances.

A few days after the showcase, Amy gets another phone call from her mom and Amy hesitates before answering.

Her mom’s called a few times more than usual in the past month or so and every time she answers her phone, she always finds herself stuck with Jake.

So she’s a little apprehensive this time round to answer the phone.

“We’re having a fiesta for Rey’s 30th,” Amy’s mom informs her over the phone.

It feels like déjà vu and she has a strong feeling her mom will invite the Peralta’s over again, except this time she’s expecting it so it won’t be a horrid surprise and it doesn’t sound so terrible to hang out with Jake again.

The horrid surprise is that Amy realises that she might, possibly, potentially, _enjoy_ Jake’s company.

“I’ll be inviting the Peralta, of course,” her mom informs her again, but Amy recognises the beginning of her mom’s curious tone, which never has bided well for Amy.

“Oh yeah,” she replies neutrally.

“Mmm,” her mom replies. Amy tries to keep her cool. “I heard that you took Jake with you to your gallery night.”

“Yep, thanks to you,” Amy answers back, still keeping it cool as a cucumber. She can feel her head start to break out into a sweat and she wonders if her mom can smell her fear over the phone.

“Did you have fun?” Her mom asks.

“I guess,” Amy replies. She shifts from one foot to the other, itching to get off the phone.

“You’re spending a lot of time with him,” she comments. “Does this mean you’re going to move in with him?”

“I haven’t really,” she replies, not wanting her mom to get ahead of herself and start telling everyone that she’s decided to move in with Jake. “You know how the showcases are ma, they can be boring and he seemed excited to go.”

“Mmm,” is all her mom says.

“So what’s the plan for Rey’s birthday? Do you need me to come over early to help set up?” Amy asks to distract her mom.

She listens as her mom then launches into her plan of attack and she’s glad to move onto another subject, even talking at length about Rey’s party, which she usually avoids because it means talking to her mom for hours, but surprisingly her mom doesn’t drag it out too much and Jake isn’t mentioned for the rest of the phone call.

It hasn’t been an hour after she gets off the phone with her mom when she gets a text from Jake that’s mostly a bunch of party emojis:

**another Santiago feeesta**

Amy rolls her eyes.

**_Is that meant to say fiesta?_ **

**same diff**

She leaves it at that but then her phone buzzes again from another text with Jake.

**wanna come over and sort my finances?**

**_Sure_ **

She doesn’t know whether to send that last text with a period or not because it seems too harsh with it, but if she adds an emoji to the end it seems too enthusiastic. She stops and stares at her phone and makes a sound of disgust.

“Why do I even care?” She asks herself, sending the message without thinking about it much longer.

**pick u up in 15**

\--

“Oh _man_ ,” Jake cries.

Amy stares at him and shakes her head. “What?”

Jake throws his hands up at the sign on the elevator, “The lift is broken!”

Amy shrugs, unsure what the problem is. “You said that you’re on the fifth floor.”

“ _Exactly_ ,” Jake tells her, his tone still exasperated.

“Seriously, dude?” Amy asks him, giving him an unimpressed look. “It’s just five flights of stairs.”

Jake trudges towards the stairs, dragging his feet against the linoleum floor and leaves his arms dangling by his sides. He groans something unintelligible and Amy just shakes her head at his dramatics and follows him up the stairs.

He lifts up each foot slowly and lets them fall on each step with a loud thump. Amy follows, but his slow pace is slowly driving her insane.

“How are you a cop?” She asks, incredulous and watches him drag his feet up the stairs.

He doesn’t answer her and continues to complain and so Amy overtakes him and reaches the fifth floor before he does and waits for him by the stair entrance.

She’s got her arms crossed and tapping her foot against the floor by the time she sees his red face appear over the steps.

“Just,” he begins, dropping his arms onto his knees and sucking in a deep breath, “give me a minute.”

She waits impatiently and watches his desperate breaths with morbid horror, until finally he directs her towards a door that reads _510_.

“Mi casa, es su casa.“ Jake waggles his eyebrows and gestures to the apartment door they’ve stopped in front of. “Admit that my Spanish turns you on.”

She rolls her eyes—becoming too frequent these days around Jake—and shakes her head. She lowers her voice in mock sensuality, “Yeah, hearing you out of breath really gets me going.”

He holds up a finger. “I know you’re putting on that sexy bedroom voice as a joke, but it’s really making me feel something.”

“Ugh, Jake!” She slaps the back of her hand half-heartedly against his shoulder while he just grins at her.

He puts his key into the door and opens it with great dramatics and whatever snarky comment Amy has prepared is stopped by the sight of a woman their age seated at the dining table, playing what sounds like a game on her phone.

Her feet are in heeled wedge sneakers and are kicked up on Jake’s dining table. Amy holds back a remark about germs, but she knows she’s got a cringe on her face just thinking about it. Her jeans are bright red and she’s got a colour clashing top on, but strangely makes it work.

“What the hell are you doing here Gina?” Jake asks. “And how did you get in?”

Jake’s friend— _girlfriend?_ Amy thinks—doesn’t make any move to take her feet off the table or pause her game. She does look up at them and Amy is taken aback by the intensity of her light blue stare.

Amy feels like Gina’s staring into her soul.

Gina’s general expression doesn’t change from aloofness. “A spirit I met at dance rehearsal led me here. She must have known I needed the toilet, because she led me directly to your door.”

Amy blinks.

“You keep a spare key hidden in the pot plant in the hall,” she continues. “God Jake, how are you this city’s first and last line of defence?”

“No, that would be the _Men in Black_ ,” Jake points out.

Amy blinks again, confused by the entire exchange.

Jake only sighs, as if he’s embarrassed that Gina doesn’t remember that Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones are the city’s main defence from aliens, and gestures towards Amy. “Gina, this is Amy. Amy, this is Gina. You remember her; she lived next to my nana.”

Suddenly it clicks that this is the same Gina who used to hang out with Jake at his nana’s house and made fun of her practical Mary Jane shoes—Gina used to wear highly impractical cork wedges, especially so for an eight year old.

She remembers that Gina used to make Jake learn her dance routine and then once made Amy sit in the audience and watch the ten minute routine.

Gina looks Amy up and down and Amy doesn’t flinch and waits for an insult.

“This is the new roomie?” Gina asks in distaste, but it sounds more like disapproval.

“Nice to see you too Gina,” Amy says to Gina, but Gina’s ignoring her.

“Why is she dressed like your nana?”

Amy looks down at her pant suit and frowns. “I had a meeting at work, this is my best suit.”

Gina doesn’t say anything else, but her eyes tell Jake that she’s judging. Hard.

She drops her feet from the table purposefully and stands. “I have to go talk to my psychic about my spiritual encounter. Toodles, girl.”

Gina marches in between them and out of the apartment and Jake closes the door behind her and spins around. “So that’s Gina.”

Amy nods. “Yeah, she hasn’t changed a bit.”

Jake laughs at that. “Basically.”

Amy decides to look around then and take in the reasonably sized apartment. There’s a _Die Hard_ poster on the wall behind the television and another in the kitchen, which she thinks is slightly obsessive.

The one above the television is Bruce Willis with a pout on his mouth holding his gun and looking intense, while the one in the kitchen looks like it’s a poster for the Turkish market—judging from the text Amy can see—and much more dramatic and too excessive for somewhere you would prepare meals. There’s a building on fire behind a constipated looking Bruce Willis holding a machine gun and helicopters flying overhead.

His lounge room has a normal three seat sofa seated in front of the television, but the rest of the house is covered in what Amy recognises as—

“Do you have _six_ massage chairs?” Amy asks incredulously.

She currently staring at where three of them have replaced actual dining chairs. Jake drops himself down into the one on the right of the sofa and nods. “Well yeah, how else am I supposed to be comfortable?”

“Maybe one I get,” Amy responds, holding a hand up. “But even then you can’t afford such luxuries, let alone _six of them_.”

Jake bites the top of his lip and shakes his head in question. “And?”

Amy throws her hands up and shakes her head. “So where are these debt receipts?”

Jake disappears into another part of the apartment which she assumes is where the bathroom and bedrooms are and while she’s sort of curious to see what Jake’s room looks like, she stays in the living room and settles herself into one of the three massage chairs at the dining table.

She’s beginning to fiddle with the buttons when Jake returns with an old shoebox and he dumps it on the dining room table dramatically.

She jumps out of the massage chair and stands beside Jake and drags the shoebox closer to her. She’s partly excited to get her hands into some paperwork and budgeting, but she doesn’t let it show because she knows Jake will only make fun of her.

“You’re super excited aren’t you?” He asks smugly, but it’s not as smug as usual and instead a little more amused.

She shrugs casually but then flips open the shoebox. Her eyes widen almost comically at the bills in front of her. Jake almost winces at her expression.

“Oh my god Peralta,” she tells him, still reading the documents, “When you said soul crushing, I thought you were over-exaggerating!”

Jake bites his bottom lip and shakes his head. “Nope! Very much soul crushing debt. No exaggerating there.”

Amy shakes her head and starts to sift through the papers, trying to keep up with all the numbers in front of her. She pauses on one document and snaps her head up at him. “You spent _five thousand_ dollars on an armchair?”

Jake isn’t sure if she’s asking him or scolding him and shrugs his shoulders sheepishly. “Yes?”

“My entire semester didn’t cost that much!” Amy exclaims.

She knew Jake was irresponsible.

She didn’t realise how much.

“Why? How?” She demands, clutching the document in her hands.

“Uh, because Santiago,” he begins in a tone that can only be described as ‘ _duh_ ’, “How else am I supposed to be comfortable watching TV?”

Amy just gapes at him, unable to form words.

“Jake,” she begins and her tone isn’t snide or judgemental or sarcastic. “I hope you realise how important this is.”

Jake bites his bottom lip and shakes his head. Amy takes a deep breath and calmly places the document back onto the kitchen table.

“Can you even afford to pay rent _here_?” She asks accusation lacing her tone.

He grins at her and she can’t believe how blasé he is about something as important as finances. “Why do you think I was looking for a roommate?”

Amy rolls her eyes, but there is a part of her that feels sorry for him. As much as she’s protested—loudly—about moving in with Jake, she knows it’s the best decision she can make right now.

She’s made a list of pros and cons (obviously).

Cons:

  1. He (mostly) annoys her.
  2. Jake is most likely (without a doubt) the messiest roommate.
  3. She will (definitely) be in situations that she rather not be caught in (e.g. potentially seeing Jake in his underwear or running into one of his dates).
  4. He (mostly) annoys her.



Even Amy can see that her pros list is logically more sound than her cons list.

Pros:

  1. Rent in Brooklyn will be much cheaper than her current apartment in Manhattan.
  2. She will be finishing university and joining the academy soon.
  3. Jake is a cop, therefore will not be bothered with weird working hours.
  4. As much as she loves her _papi_ and _mam_ _á_ , she will not survive living at home again.
  5. Jake will be able to tell her about the academy and being a beat cop.
  6. Regardless, she will be evicted from her current apartment in a few weeks.



She also has to admit to herself that:

  1. Jake might not be that annoying.



She hasn’t given Jake any indication that she will eventually move in, but if she is to move in with him he _has_ to get his finances in order. She can’t be living with someone who could potentially put financial strain on her.

“Peralta.”

Her tone is serious and commanding, which immediately makes Jake straighten up in his chair and drop his arms without thinking about it.

She almost smiles. “You seriously need to get your shit together dude.”

His shoulders drop and he grins at her when he says. “But that would mean growing up.”

Amy purses her lips to stop the smile breaking across her face.

\--

They spend the afternoon sifting through the receipts to determine which ones are still outstanding and which he has already settled—unfortunately, Amy is only able to remove a small stack of receipts—but stop once they finish.

They agree to meet again to sort this out properly in a few days and Amy takes home the shoebox so that she can create a binder and spreadsheet to teach Jake how to deal with his finances.

Somehow Amy ends up staying back after Jake asks if she wants to watch Criminal Minds and they end up ordering take-out and comfortably settled across each end of his couch. She’s sitting on the end, her feet tucked under her and a bowl in her hand while Jake has his head resting on the armrest, lying on his back and knees propped up.

They’ve just finished an episode and it’s been a while since they’re had a break, so Jake pauses the show as Amy puts down her empty bowl and stands up and stretches. She frowns slightly at her creased pants, but is glad that her blazer is at least crinkle-free after hanging it on one of Jake’s non-massage dining chairs.

“God, what time is it?” She asks, yawning slightly and swinging her arms side to side to crack the stiffness out of her back.

“Ummmm,” Jake starts, picking up his phone, “nine-thirty.”

Amy groans and starts cleaning up the coffee table. She can’t believe that she’s spent at least ten hours in Jake’s company and hasn’t spontaneously combust. “I probably should start heading home.”

She misses the look of disappointment on Jake’s face as she carries the plates into the kitchen and sorts out of the take-away containers into their proper bins. Jake follows her into the kitchen and leans against the counter.

“Just leave the dishes, I can do them,” he tells her.

Amy hovers by the sink, knowing that Jake might put them off until the next day.

He laughs at her hesitation, as if sensing her thoughts and says, “I’ll do them as soon as you leave, I promise.”

“Okay,” she agrees slowly.

“So when do we want to tackle my soul-crushing debt?” He asks her, rubbing his hands together. “I’m free tomorrow?”

Amy yawns again and moves towards the dining room to gather her bag and her blazer. “Can’t, sorry. I have a shift at the gallery and then at Applebee’s. Maybe Thursday?”

Jake nods and follows her to the door. “I can do the evening, after five.”

“Yeah, I can do that,” Amy tells him, checking her phone distractedly.

“You bring the receipts and I’ll get some take-out,” he tells her.

She looks up and smiles briefly. “Sure, see you later.”

“You’re the best, Amy,” he tells her and she just shakes her head.

She doesn’t wait for Jake’s goodbye, but she can hear him say it as she closes his apartment door behind her. She can still hear him behind the door as she heads for the stairs and rolls her eyes as he continues to say goodbye and tell her she’s the best.

“Fucking weirdo,” she laughs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a while! I'm finally back home and hopefully have enough inspiration to get those chapters out! 
> 
> Europe was amazing btw, highly recommend.

**Author's Note:**

> A few things: 
> 
> 1\. So the Amy you see in this fic is based on the Amy you see in the 'Pilot', who's a Latina cop who grew up in Jersey and doesn't deal with bullshit (since I'm back to rewatching the series). I know there are a few interpretations out there of Amy in college/high school where she's some timid, insecure girl (which I definitely agree is one facet of her personality) but I can totally imagine that an Amy where she's a senior in college and is about to join the academy will be tough and takes no bullshit. Plus, dealing with seven brothers, a family I imagine to be overbearing and Jake Peralta would probably make Amy a bit more fed up with life. 
> 
> 2\. I'm not entirely sure what Jake does after high school like college or whatever, but it does say according to my research that you need 60 credit points, which I have no idea if that's a full degree or like a short course or whatever? I'm an Aussie, so if any of you beautiful people know the New York college system that would be fab. I also don't know where Amy did Art History but I'm just gonna NYU since that's competitive and she's competitive (and I think that's where Melissa went). I also probably messed up with Kylie getting a grad spot after graduation, but ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ 
> 
> 3\. I also know nothing about Kylie except that she's Amy's friend and has a job. So I've been vague about her character until I rewatch and get more intel. But for story's sake let's pretend she goes interstate for grad school and ends up moving back to New York once she's done.


End file.
